Hivemind
by Barbacar
Summary: Set in an AU I came up with the other day. Weirdmageddon is over, but staying in the bubble for as long as she did had some unusual effects on Mabel


Dipper slowly walked into the attic bedroom, which he soon found to be infested with hundreds of skittering insects, each black with a red glow. Most of them were cockroach-like, but there were a few similar to ants, spiders, beetles, maggots and a few other types of bugs.

Dipper was uneasy at this, but not nearly as disturbed as he would've been a week or so ago. He carefully walked across the room, taking care not to accidentally step on any bugs, and sat down on his bed.

He sighed as he looked at all the bugs skittering around the room, some of them crawling through small cracks in the wall and along the windowsill.

"Mabel, I told you that you shouldn't be doing this." he said.

Right after he said this, all the bugs started scampering, skittering, and moving towards Mabel's bed. A few entered the room through the open door or through small holes in the walls. Soon, every bug in sight had gathered into a giant pile on Mabel's bed. Over the course of a few seconds, the bug pile began to morph into the unmistakable image of Mabel.

"I know, but it's kinda hard, you know?" said Mabel.

"I know." said Dipper, looking slightly towards the ground. "But we still don't know much about your... condition, so in the mean time you should-"

"Yeah, yeah." said Mabel. "I've heard it before."

With that, Mabel quickly turned back into a mass of bugs and fell apart into a pile, a sight Dipper still wasn't used to. A few seconds later, the bug pile morphed into a near-perfect copy of Dipper.

"Don't get too scattered all over the place, Mabel, 'cause we don't know what'll happen to all your little bugs and their bug brains if they get too far apart or one of them gets lost or whatever." said the Dipper copy.

The Dipper copy promptly fell apart into a pile of bugs. As they formed back into Mabel, Dipper managed a small smile and said "That's not exactly what I said, but it's the gist, I guess."

Dipper took a look at Mabel, who was now finished shifting back. If he didn't know any better, he would think there was nothing wrong at all. She sure didn't look like there was anything wrong with her just by looking at her.

Dipper let out a long sigh. "Mabel, I promise I'm gonna get you back to the way you were before... before things went wrong."

It was far from the first time Dipper had said that, but he meant it every time.

"You sure?" asked Mabel. "I'm starting to get used to being a pile of bugs. Never thought I'd say something like that, but it's really not that bad."

"You'd... you'd be alright staying like this forever?" asked Dipper.

Mabel grinned slightly and said "Well, there's a bright side to it. I can turn into whatever I want, and be in a bunch of different places at once, and the silk should be pretty good for making sweaters with, and it's also fun to use it to play pranks and stuff on people. Remember last night with the toothbrush and the sink?"

"Yeah, that was pretty crazy, but what about when we go home? Are we just gonna tell Mom and Dad away? I don't think we can keep something so major a secret from them forever. I mean, the next time you get a check-up, the doctors'll notice that you have hundreds of heartbeats." said Dipper.

"Yeah," said Mabel, scratching her head. "There are some downsides to all this, that's for sure. For one, it's hard keeping up my shape or form, or whatever it's supposed to be called, and I keep falling apart back into bugs, which can be awkward. Especially the first time it happened in front of Candy and Grenda, and they freaked out and thought I was dead for a few seconds. Speaking of being dead, if I _did_ die, would I become one regular Mabel ghost, or a lot of little bug Mabel ghosts? And if it is a bunch of little bug ghosts, would they all join up together again, or would they go their separate ways? And also, I'm kinda nervous about transforming in front of Waddles because I'm not sure if he'll try to eat some of my bugs or not, and if he does-"

"I know." said Dipper, turning away. "I know it's been difficult, and it'll probably be difficult until we find a cure, if there even is one. I just... I'm sorry."

Dipper heard an odd, but familiar noise, then several hundred skittering noises at once that grew closer, then another odd, but familiar noise. He felt a hand placed on his shoulder.

"Hey." said Mabel. "I don't want you to blame yourself for something that's not your fault. As soon as you got into the bubble, you did everything you could to get me out. It was my own dumb decision to stay in there for three and a half days without even trying to leave, and to try and stay there even after you tried to get me out. So if anything, what happened to me is my own fault."

Dipper turned to look at Mabel. "I don't want you blaming yourself, either." he said. "You couldn't have known what staying in there so long would do to you, and if I hadn't-"

"Look, bro-bro." said Mabel with a smile. "Weirdmageddon is over. Sure, some of us might have messed up..."

She looked down with a guilty look and a frown, saying "...and some of us messed up way, way, _way_ more than others..."

Mabel looked back up at Dipper, starting to smile again "...but even though a lot of us went through a lot, we all survived it in one piece." Mabel giggled a bit and said "Well, except for me. I survived it in a couple hundred pieces."

Dipper reacted to that last part in what could be described as a simultaneous cringe and chuckle. "Well, I should be probably be getting to bed."

"Oh, that reminds me! You know how last night you said you had trouble sleeping because your pillow was all flat and hot?" said Mabel

"I don't remember saying that." said Dipper.

"Well, you were kinda muttering it when you were half-asleep." said Mabel. "Anyway, I think your four-hundred and seventy-four sisters have a solution."

"Is that how many... bugs there are?" asked Dipper.

"Just a guess." said Mabel. With that, she once again dissolved into a swarm of bugs. Dipper carefully stepped aside as the bug swarm crawled onto his bed and split into two groups. One group gently moved his pillow aside and transformed into a big, colourful pillow. The other group morphed into a wide, brightly coloured blanket that draped over the bed.

"Oh, uh, thanks, I guess." said Dipper. "Are you sure about this?" Dipper then figured that his sister probably couldn't talk in her current form. He just shrugged at the oddness of the whole situation and got into bed, laying down on the very soft and cool pillow.

"Goodnight, Mabel." said Dipper as he closed his eyes, drifting off to sleep soon after.

Things were still pretty weird even after Weirdmageddon ended, but there was a bright side to it all.


End file.
